1 Mar 2014

garden share collective: march

The two enemies of all tender young seedlings are the intense Tassie sun, which will zap you in seconds, and the blackbirds, well-documented here at Dig In.

So hats off to my mother for inventing this brilliant contraption; simple but effective:

What's hiding beneath?

A lettuce seedling!
 
It’s a very old wire hanging basket, upside down, held to the ground with hooks, and a handkerchief of shade cloth pegged to it. Secure against UV and birds, but still letting light and air and water in. Genius!


This month’s garden Share Collective post comes from my dad’s garden. If you’re a long-time reader of Dig In, you’re familiar with the space; I’ve chronicled it before, in totally opposite conditions – good times and bad.

So as my vegie garden is quietly and slowly growing along (I’m eating my tomatoes and zucchinis!), I thought we’d travel the winding highway down the Tasman Peninsula to visit mum and dad’s garden.
Let’s start by exploding the myth that some of you may be entertaining about the lush green Tassie countryside. Not so. In fact, I went to the opposite end of the state recently — to Burnie in the north-west — which is usually eye-achingly emerald. In a perverse way, I was looking forward to, well, turning green with envy. But no, there too it was brittle and beige. This hot dry summer has a lot to answer for.

Anyway, back to Boomer Bay. Dad, as you can see, clearly does not believe in mulch. He has only recently started putting it about (see the top pic), probably because I kept threatening to come down and do it for him. Time is the enemy — you may think once you’re retired, you’ll have endless, languid hours to while away; no, mum and dad say they are busier than ever. But they are also still doing ongoing work to fix the damage to their gardens from the January 2013 bushfires.


I actually had the bright idea of spotlighting dad’s garden for you after we’d done the morning harvest: ice cream containers full of scarlet runner beans (my favourite, with a strangely rough skin and flame-coloured flowers, and which I cannot grow at my place); the tomatoes — still early in the season, in all their gnarly glory. I am convinced that ugly tomatoes — ridged, bulbous, striped or blackened — have the best flavour.


Like tomatoes, I will happily ignore bland corn in the shops and wait for those brief summer weeks when dad’s crop is ready (I can’t fit corn in my vegie garden; tried one year and could fit nothing else!). The memory of homegrown corn’s sweet starchiness (and bits caught between the teeth) carries me thru until the next season.


Let’s go back and have a closer look at those tomatoes - they look a bit like someone crucified, arms outstretched. Apparently this is what you do.

 
Here is the work of a man who knows what he is doing — who clearly understands The Mysteries of The Tomato. This is what I will be aiming for next year. Maybe in 30 years time I will get it right (then again, my friend F does next to nothing to her tomato plants and she has pretty abundant crops. To discipline or not to discipline; that is the tomato question).

 
Mum's basil - not dad's. Important distinction. Also - better than my basil. You win the basil competition this year, mum
 
On an un-illustrated note, the fruit and berry harvests have been smaller this year. The fires destroyed some of dad’s trees; other factors have also taken their toll. Time to tend the trees has been an issue, as I said, with other garden resurrection tasks taking priority.

The parrots and other birds got in to the beautiful cleo apples before dad got to netting them, pointlessly pecking at unripe fruit then leaving it, damaged. And one Sunday of ferocious winds blew off half the quince crop, weeks before the nubbly fruit was ready.

In some ways, it’s meant we are not dealing with a glut of fruit (freezing, jamming, stewing, baking as well as eating), which can be seriously daunting. On the other hand, it is sad not to be so abundantly blessed by the usual richness of homegrown berries, stone and pome fruit.

Yes, gardening is a joy, full of pretty, delicious things, but it is also a hard lesson in realities; a reminder that Mother Nature will always have the upper hand — even if what she deals out is senseless and frustrating. Gardeners have to develop thick skins, to take the good with the bad.


36 comments:

  1. Love the idea with the inverted hanging baskets - think I will have to pinch that one. And enjoyed the tour of your father's garden - thank you!

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    1. hi linda! it's an excellent solution that mum has invented, isn't? go right ahead and pinch :-)

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  2. The idea of having to protect seedlings from too much sun made me laugh... well I do garden in Yorkshire, a region of the world not known for abundant sunshine! Your dad sounds to be coping with some major weather and pest problems this year. The tomatoes and corn still look pretty good though, and your mum's basil looks fantastic.

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    1. thank you GD - i shall pass all your compliments on to mum and dad. i'm heading down again next weekend so i hope they have saved me some corn.
      you probably have far deeper frosts in yorkshire than we have to contend with here, and i guess glass cloches are the winter versions of mum's 'sunhats' !

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  3. Great post e :-) The parents garden is always interesting! My mother is also yet to discover the virtues of mulch, despite my repeated mentioning that it is 'the key' in hot weather.. Some very interesting tomato vine training going on there. I'm sure it would be quite effective. I'm at the complete opposite end of the spectrum and have trouble disciplining. I admire those who can and do.

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    1. i must stay, for all my ribbing, dad's mulch-free garden is still miles ahead of mine.
      i'm a bit like you jacqui - i'm not very good at disciplining plants. if they are at least growing, who am i to curtail them in anyway?

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  4. The basket is a great idea. Your dad's garden looks wonderful and sounds very productive. His corn looks amazing. I held high hopes for mine and it was so disappointing, but as you say you take the good and bad. Have a great month.

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    1. the basket is such a simple idea but it really is working; anything that protects against blackbirds is a god-send. maybe there will now be upside down baskets popping up all over the country!
      happy gardening days ahead to you too, kyrstie.

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  5. What a great idea. Clearly your mum is where you get your smarts from :)
    Your dad's garden still looks great, even if not so green as usual. I love the escaped silverbeet.

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    1. i'll let mum know you said that bec ;-)
      yes, there is always an errant plant somewhere, and this silverneet looked so lovely growing with some straggly marigolds. you have to respect those hardy souls that grow in the walkways.

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  6. Love your post and your Dad's garden! I don't remember my father mulching either. I can't help myself! Love that basil too - your Mum is a star. I think I have tomato envy now too. Have a great month gardening!

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    1. thanks frogpond - and you too!
      yes, i always have tomato and basil envy at this time of the year :-) but i get some if mine aren't so bountiful, so i'm very lucky.

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  7. Wonderful post E. If I ever get to Tassie, I'm going to take a garden tour of your parents' place! Those huge onions are very inspiring. Love your lettuce shade house too -- not that we need them here. We had a hail warning today. Fortunately it ended up as just a thunder storm with rain.

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    1. maybe the shade cloth hats would protect against the hail? we don't get much hail here, and never big dangerous stuff. i kinda miss the extreme weather, but not the damage it does.
      and i'm sure mum and dad would be happy to see you!

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  8. Gggggrrrrrr, the blackbirds! I know they are good at eating all the baby snails, but gosh they make a mess and shred a seedling.

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    1. and they sing beautifully, and they are fun to watch when they have a bath... but yes becs, ggggrrrrrr! :-)

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  9. Love your Mother's contraption. I might have to employ a version of it here myself. Downpours have washed away my recently planted seedlings every time. My garden is basically empty as I've been able to plant nothing! x

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    1. hey carla! what's a "downpour"? no decent rain here for weeks...months!but i can imagine how sad it would be to watch your hard work being washed away.
      this country is full of extremes.

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  10. I love this garden and and its contraptions. Very clever and effective! There is a lot of love, dedication and joy in this garden.

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    1. thank you SB. and hard work and sweat and manure as well ;-)

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  11. I love your tomatoes! I think they grow best in the southern states, growing big before ripening. Your anti-blackbird contraption is brilliant. Both yours and your parents gardens are looking wonderful, keep up the good work. (P.S. I so know what you mean about store bought corn :D)

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    1. i shall dad you are impressed by the toms! we both have been growing some good sized ones, which is a real pleasure to see such big juicy fruit.
      thanks, merryn for the lovely words (and the fellow vote for real corn!)

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  12. Hello e, it looks like you and your parents have been busy! I love the lettuce seedling covers, genius! Your parent's garden looks productive and well loved. I have instant tomato envy, they look gnarly and beautiful. How disappointing to have lost those precious quinces. I agree...corn takes up a lot of space doesn't it? Wise words; gardeners do need to take the good with the bad. Happy gardening to you!

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    1. thank you for your thoughtful words jane, and happy gardening ahead to you, too.
      it seems the quince loss is not as bad as we thought, because last night mum told me she had kilos ready for cooking. yum! i want to make quince jelly and paste this year.

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  13. Your folks garden is amazing, your dad is really a great one to have round to poke and prod your garden along. Lets hope we all get some rain and some cooler weather soon. The shade cloth for lettuces are key at the moment even for us up here.

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    1. what did we do before shadecloth? hessian i guess. it's proving to be very useful in the war and against brid and UV.
      yes to rain for all of us, please. i love the warmer months - they are all too brief here in hobart - but i will be glad to get some rain.

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  14. I'm always so amazed at your garden. I wish, wish, wish I had the space to do something like this. My dad actually came to tidy up my (neglected) garden the other day - thank goodness for dads with a green thumb, eh? ;)

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    1. dads are the best gardeners, one day we will be like them! As I said, give me thirty years perhaps... thank you Christina for your lovely words.

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  15. Hello, I just found your lovely blog when I saw a comment from you on Apartment Therapy - the small, wide web world!
    We've just come back from a great, but too short, holiday at Eggs and Bacon Bay and the bloke and I are making a permanent move to Hobart in October. I am so looking forward to having a productive vegetable garden and will need all the help and inspiration I can get. You are on the favourites list! Fiona.

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    1. Wow, those web things really do bring people together! I am always pleasantly surprised. Hello Fiona, and welcome to Dig In. And thank you for making me a favourite already - you've made my day.
      where are you moving from? 'the mainland' ? (me too originally). don't forget to pack your woollies - october can still be very cold.
      hope to see you here again. e

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    2. I will be here again, and often - still have so much to catch up on...
      We are moving from Sydney and every day we look at the weather in Hobart and say "beautiful" even if it's 2 - 10 deg range!! I love the changeability of Tasmanian weather. Fiona

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    3. You are missing a great time of the year - autumn is just perfection.
      and you get used to the lower temps - thinking that anything over 24 is too hot! it's not that bad ;-)
      though 2-10 - that must be cold little liawenee! brrr!
      ah, you will discover the weather is an ongoing conversation in tassie...

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  16. e, I just LOVE seeing what is happening in your dad's garden. It's such a proper Tassie vegie garden, isn't it? All about getting on and feeding the family and doing things the way they have always been done, frugally and with great common sense (I imagine he was very resistant to shelling out for pea straw!). I do hope there is a sense of returning normality in their town, although I imagine the recovery will take years. And such a dry summer, it doesn't help, does it?

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    1. dad has had stern words to me about his mulch use, jo - i shall be correcting the record for him next garden share post. but yes, cost is a factor, for such a large area.
      things are happenign in dunally and boomer bay, houses going up - so yes, while it will take years, there is rebuilding.
      and wow yes, it's been a very dry summer. thank you for your lovely words jo!

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  17. He has a wonderful garden! It's really beautiful!

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  18. good morning ock, and welcome to Dig In! i shall pass your lovely words onto dad ;-)

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